The first week of the baseball season is a special time for players and their gloves. The night before Opening Day, Reds second baseman Brandon Phillips explained the five gloves he had carefully placed in his locker. He has three practice gloves, all significantly smaller than his game glove; a smaller glove helps him look the ball into his glove a little better and a little longer. He has a backup game glove and his game glove, which was placed, pocket side down, with a batting glove strategically placed where his hand enters the glove.
“You can touch my practice gloves, but no one touches my game glove, no one,” Phillips said with a smile, though he wasn’t kidding. “I put the batting glove on top of my glove so I’ll know if someone has touched my glove. If the batting glove has moved, someone touched my glove. [Reds pitcher Mat Latos] held my glove this spring, but he didn’t put it on. Hey, defense is important to me. If he’d put his hand in my glove, we’d have fought.”
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A player’s glove, especially for a good defensive player, is his most personal piece of equipment, and it is treated with great respect and care. Cubs second baseman Darwin Barney takes five gloves – all the exact same model and size – with him on all road trips.
“I am very particular about my glove,” Barney said. “I never use my game glove except to play in the game. I don’t use it during BP. I don’t play catch with it before a game. The first time I touch it on the day of game is when I’m running out to my position to start the game. If I play catch with it too often, it can make the pocket too deep. The other four gloves, I rank them. My No. 2 glove is next in line. Last year in Washington, I went to my backhand and the ball popped out of my glove. That was it for that glove. I put it away and never used it again. It lasted a year and a half, but that was it. I couldn’t use it anymore.”
His No. 2 glove became his game glove that day. “Each glove I have is at a different level of being broken in,” he said. “My No. 5 glove isn’t ready to be a gamer, but it will be.”
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Cubs utility man Jeff Baker is nearly as particular about his many gloves. He has a glove to play second base, another to play third base, one for the outfield and a mitt for first base.
“No one touches my glove for second base or my glove for third,” he said. “They are different. My glove for second base is 11½ inches, my glove for third is 12 inches. At second, I need a smaller glove because I have to know when I reach into my glove to grip the ball, it has to be in the same place every time, it can’t get lost in my glove. If someone puts my glove on his hand, and stretches out my glove, and now it’s a quarter of an inch off, then we have problems. That may be the difference between making the double play or not. At third base, I need the extra half inch in the glove. The ball hit down the line, that half inch might be the difference between getting an out, or the ball going for a double. The ball hit to my left, that half inch might be the difference between a hit and a double play. Even on the ball hit right at me at third, mentally I feel better with that extra half inch.”
Baker said he isn’t as particular about his outfield glove or his first baseman’s mitt.
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